Jonathan Frakes: "Star Trek won't be coming back to TV."
- Thread starter JTShanks
- Start date
I'm not so sure about that. The prequel premise alienated both Trek fans and the general public alike. I remember back when Enterprise started on german tv, people who were occasionally watching Star Trek in its various forms thought that the creators of Trek had run out of ideas so that they had to resort to that lame prequel idea. They felt kind of insulted that they were expected to believe that this series took place a hundred years before Kirk.
And I don't need to remind you of how real Trek fans reacted to Enterprise, do I?
Quantity doesn't automatically rule out quality. And one movie every few years doesn't automatically mean quality. We had to wait four years for STID, and what we got was far away from a high quality story. I hope they'll do better with the next movie.
The time period was irrelevant. By the time ENT was being produced, people simply were sick of Trek. If the problem really was that ENT was a prequel, then Star Trek: Nemesis should have made tons of money, being a TNG movie. But it didn't. It bombed.
Yeah you do, because I have no idea what you're talking about. Who are "real" Star Trek fans?
It bombed because it stank.
I remember some diehard TNG fan at the time kept going on and on about how great Nemesis was going to be. The very night it was released in theaters, he posted a thread entitled, "That movie was a disaster!"
Kor
People on this board, for example? I remember Enterprise being ripped apart back then, the only thing people seemed to like were Jolene Blalock's fake boobs ... something that I will never even begin to understand.
It bombed because it stank.
I remember some diehard TNG fan at the time kept going on and on about how great Nemesis was going to be. The very night it was released in theaters, he posted a thread entitled, "That movie was a disaster!"
Kor
Exactly. Insurrection was a big disappointment, and after four years of waiting Nemesis turned out the be an even bigger disappointment.
If even die hard Trek fans reject a movie, then the general audience is taking that as a bad sign ... and will not bother to see that movie.
IrishNero
Commodore
I believe this is old news. Frakes has been parroting the same information for nearly a decade. They may legitimately think that Trek would be diluted, but there is an equal chance that Frakes' idea just didn't seem viable to them. Unless he sprung it on them on the spur of the moment, they were aware of his meeting agenda, so they must have been open to the idea on some level. Networks and studios are about profit, not about entertainment, and a good businessman never says 'never.' If they saw a great opportunity and the business climate was right, they would put another Trek on the air. I don't see it anytime soon though. The rate of return on the new movies is just too good to risk it.
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I'm a "real Star Trek fan," and I liked it.
Which is not all that relevant - most hardcore fans stuck with that show until the bitter end, screaming and complaining and declaring every two weeks that they were done with it (except for the ones who watched every week and then dropped around to remind everyone that they'd never seen the show).
It was the continued, predictable loss of the casual viewership that sank the Franchise, not disillusionment on the part of fans. If hardcore fans insist that they should be serviced without regard to what appeals to the public at large, they're dooming future Star Trek productions as well.
You deserve a medal.
I remember some diehard TNG fan at the time kept going on and on about how great Nemesis was going to be. The very night it was released in theaters, he posted a thread entitled, "That movie was a disaster!"
Kor
Exactly. Insurrection was a big disappointment, and after four years of waiting Nemesis turned out the be an even bigger disappointment.
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No it wasn't. The thing to remember was that INSURRECTION was so bad, that after that, there was nowhere to go but up.
NEMESIS may not have been a great movie, but it was light-years ahead of INSURRECTION.
I will agree that Nemesis is a better movie than Insurrection. But the proof is in the box office receipts. Not the quality.
Insurrection made $70.2 million.
Nemesis made $43.3.
That is a major drop off. Even if you adjust for inflation with Insurrection coming in at $119.4 million and Nemesis at $59.8), Nemesis is not only a failure, but a pretty dismal one.
Source: Box Office Mojo
Insurrection made $70.2 million.
Nemesis made $43.3.
That is a major drop off. Even if you adjust for inflation with Insurrection coming in at $119.4 million and Nemesis at $59.8), Nemesis is not only a failure, but a pretty dismal one.
Source: Box Office Mojo
I think you're giving too much creedence into ticket sales and money gross. Quality and reviews as well as public opinion do matter too.
I mean look at Star Trek IV, even if you adjusted for inflation it is still the highest grossing movie in the Trek franchise (other than the rebooted films); but if it was so successful why did the studio not partake after the formula of the 4th Trek movie into future installments?
Because critique-wise; the movie WAS NOT successful; it got mixed review by many and I have met a few fellow Trekfans that say next to Trek5, it's the worst movie in the series.
Not that Trek5 improved on Trek4's shortcomings in anyway; there is no reason to believe that they think it can work again.
And before you use Michael Bay's Transformers as a means of saying I'm wrong, look into the actual reviews for it; there is a legit fanbase for it and people who think they're good movies (I know... people are weird.)
I think you guys might be missing the boat here a little.
Quality did decline, writers were split between two series, initially.(DS9 was absolute garbage initially, as the proper writing staff wasn't available, in a show that was ideally set for 60 episodes not 160, although I still think it's one of the best Sci fi's ever made.). Voyager simply didn't believe in itself, and enterprise had colossal issues.
1) Rod Stewart theme song, (like seriously way to alienate an a young audience), a captain that had a huge allegory to George bush, in contrast to picard. etc etc
Television changed, syndication became second tier television by default.
Later series competed with themselves.
Competition that was never scene before the 90s, B5, STargate, Farscape, and BSG all came along.
Far more importantly the times simply changed. Younger generations such as myself grew up watching TNG. The moral messages were common sense.
These shows fails to adapt to the times, instead rehashing the same format used in 1987 in 2005, meanwhile competing shows were making jokes at the expense of star trek tropes.
Quality did decline, writers were split between two series, initially.(DS9 was absolute garbage initially, as the proper writing staff wasn't available, in a show that was ideally set for 60 episodes not 160, although I still think it's one of the best Sci fi's ever made.). Voyager simply didn't believe in itself, and enterprise had colossal issues.
1) Rod Stewart theme song, (like seriously way to alienate an a young audience), a captain that had a huge allegory to George bush, in contrast to picard. etc etc
Television changed, syndication became second tier television by default.
Later series competed with themselves.
Competition that was never scene before the 90s, B5, STargate, Farscape, and BSG all came along.
Far more importantly the times simply changed. Younger generations such as myself grew up watching TNG. The moral messages were common sense.
These shows fails to adapt to the times, instead rehashing the same format used in 1987 in 2005, meanwhile competing shows were making jokes at the expense of star trek tropes.
"Quality" in the sense that it's endlessly discussed in regard to pop culture is a matter of each viewer's opinion. The only reliable measure of "public opinion" that matters in commercial television and filmmaking is what people will pay to watch.
Exactly. Disney just spent billions for Marvel and Lucasfilms, so they're going to push them as much as possible to recoup that investment in the near term.
The real test will be in 15 years if people are still stoked for new productions for these franchises, or if it's an eye-rolling "they're beating that dead horse some more?"
IrishNero
Commodore
I've got this one! 'Real' Star Trek fans are those that believe as you do, and like what you like. The rest are all wannabes, posers and misinformed.
I gotta agree here.
Why exactly do you think there was so much humor in Star Trek V? Because Star Trek IV made a shit ton of money. The financial success of The Voyage Home directly influenced The Final Frontier.
^this - Dennis, you're on a roll. I'd upvote you but this UI doesn't provide a means to ;-)
I dropped out on Enterprise simply because I was bored. It wasn't any better or worse than most of the rest of Star Trek. The reason I'm happy with a movie every few years and an occasional novel is because it doesn't overwhelm me.
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